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Tuesday 5 April 2011

Ko Samui Properties Blog April 2011

The main topic of conversation recently has been the unseasonable spell of extremely wet weather to hit Samui and Southern Thailand. It has been more like the Autumnal rainy season with roads flooded and impassable in places. Bangkok has also suffered and there have been complaints of extremely cold (for Thailand) weather there as well.

The Samui Gazette (hard copy) had an interesting article written by a source at NASA Meteorological Dept explaining why this has happened. Apparently it is due to a High forming over central China at the same time as a Low formed over India. This created a steep pressure ridge over northern Thailand. Then another Low formed over Bangladesh followed by a further Low off the coast of Malaysia. Put together this combination of weather systems created strong easterly winds and lots of rain.

There are some extremely good sources for weather information available on the web. The main one is the Thai Met Office and they can be found here . There are links to weather maps, weather radar and forecasts here. Another useful link is to WindGuru which gives a while range of predictions for a few days ahead in 3 hourly segments.

Infrastructure has taken a severe pounding and the ring road has been damaged in many places – not the least of which was the rock fall on the section between Chaweng and Lamai just short of the Cliff Restaurant as these photographs show.


The airport has been closed for two days and the ferries have not been running so there are many stranded tourists here and in Koh Tai and Koh Phangan. The British Embassy sent down a small team to assist UK nationals where they could and the Thai Navy sent their Aircraft Carrier into the area to evacuate people by helicopter although I hear there were times when that operation had to be suspended due to high wind speeds.

Hard wired internet connections have been down since Tuesday with only the Air Cards having a connection if you live in an area with a good signal. Mobile phone networks have been badly affected but are gradually getting back to normal.

As I write this Newsletter reports are coming in of collapsed Villas in North Chaweng.

As of Thursday morning the rain had almost stopped and the flood waters are receding very quickly. Central Government have promised Baht 50 million to help with immediate repairs As of today, Friday things are gradually getting back to normal – albeit slowly
Of course Songkran starts on the 13th April – maybe this year we will not need water pistols!


For a copy of the full Newsletter please send an email to hbonning@kosamuiproperties.com

4 comments:

Ko Samui Villas said...

Goodness - the weather last month really was extreme wasn't it? I'm so glad that the beautiful sunshine has finally returned to the island.

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